Which civil servants will be reduced in 2020

Content

1 Reformation Background
2 What to expect
3 Changes in pay
4 Expert opinion

The Russian authorities announced which civil servants will be reduced in 2020 as part of the reform of the state apparatus. The planned changes are designed to create conditions for better performance of state functions, including the provision of public services to citizens.

Reformation Background

The question of the need to reduce the number of civil servants has been raised in Russia for several years, but the latest news suggests that in 2020 the authorities will move from words to deeds.

The previous reform to reduce the number of civil servants was announced in 2016. But with the declared decrease of 10% in practice, only 1.4% of the employees were reduced. By 2017, the total staff grew by 1.2% and amounted to 2.1 million people, and by 2019 reached 2.4 million.

Thus, the officials themselves admit that the staff of territorial and central government bodies is currently irrationally formed: it contains redundant structures that duplicate each other's functions and completely perform duties that are not inherent to them. Accordingly, there is a need for reform and optimization.

Another prerequisite for the revision of the number of staff of government agencies is the gradual replacement of a number of duties of real employees with innovative automated programs. Modern systems are able to accept citizens' appeals, send them by necessary specialists, even answer the most common ones. Every year the algorithms are only being improved, which will also affect the labor market.

What to expect

The Ministry of Finance proposes to reform the civil service in 2 stages:

Automatic reduction in the number of civil servants: by 10% for federal structures of state bodies, by 5% - for territorial - by 5% in 2020. For the latter, it is planned to bring this indicator to 15% by 2021.
Improving the structure of the state apparatus will result in an additional reduction in the number of staff. For this purpose, it is planned to consolidate and transform the territorial bodies and departments into separate branches that do not have the status of a legal entity and additional units.

The result of the reform should be the formation of compact front offices, which will not require employees involved in providing various aspects of the activity (information, documentation, administrative, etc.).

Heads of government agencies themselves will directly determine the list of civil service employees falling under reduction in 2020. To help them, the Ministry of Finance is now developing the so-called register of functions and powers of federal executive bodies. He must establish a list of the powers of the latter, the costs of their implementation and determine the "extra" elements (duplicate, irrelevant or unrealizable).

To optimize the number of staff, it is planned to use several more tools in terms of providing powers and functions:

centralization (for example, procurement for jointly placed government agencies) in order to reduce the number of specialists involved in the implementation of the relevant functions;
specialization, which involves the transfer of certain powers to special institutions or government agencies (for example, the Federal Treasury will be charged and paid).

Girl in the office

Changes in pay

Amid a reduction in civil servants, the general wage fund will remain unchanged.Accordingly, due to the funds released due to the decrease in staff, it is planned to increase the salary of the remaining employees. Otherwise, it will be impossible to provide them with a competitive payment level. For these purposes, an additional about 100 billion rubles is needed. annually, which are simply not in the federal budget. In the case of the rejection of large-scale cuts, wages will, as before, be raised only due to annual indexation by inflation, which in essence does not lead to an improvement in the well-being of citizens.

Along with the increase in salaries of civil servants, it is planned to change the payment system itself. If now the salary consists of 40% of the fixed part and 60% of floating incentive payments, then in the near future the ratio will change exactly the opposite.

Expert opinion

Experts are ambiguous about the upcoming changes in the state bodies:

Pavel Salin, director of the Center for Political Studies of the Financial University, recalls the previously announced cuts, the result of which was not only a real decrease in the number of civil servants, but also an increase in their number. If it comes to real action, Salin suggests that, first of all, they will cut not real employees, but unfilled vacancies.
Sergei Myasoedov, director of the Institute of Business and Business Administration of the Russian Academy of National Economy and Public Administration, suggests that the main criterion for large-scale reductions should be the effectiveness of employees. Therefore, the reform will primarily affect those who are accustomed to work poorly and become an incentive for old staff not just to “sit on the neck of the state and eat up the state budget,” but to work more efficiently.
Marat Bashirov, a political scientist, talks about a possible job loss for low-paid workers of the lowest ranks. In his opinion, this will not provide significant budget savings, but will eliminate the civil servants whose job is only to prepare all kinds of certificates and reports for their superiors.

Mass reduction of officials in 2020: video